Killer Mike, who was recently reported to be working on some new Run the Jewels music with El-P and production god Rick Rubin, took part in a Washington Post-hosted free speech debate earlier this week during which he pointed to the influence of fellow artists on the continued nationwide acceptance of marijuana.
"We know that with national decriminalization of marijuana now, a lot of people are going to get credit for it—a lot of activists, a lot of workers," Killer Mike said. "But I can show you a line that leads straight back to Cypress Hill, that leads straight back to Snoop Dogg, that leads straight back to people like Rick James."
This omission in marijuana history, he added, is representative of a larger problem within media narratives that routinely hurls prejudice against artists of a specific genre.
"[I]f the media treats rappers differently than they do country artists, then you're going to see a galvanization of what the prejudices that we already see," he said. Catch an archived stream of the full panel discussion above.
On the legalization battlefront, dummies with undeserved power in particularly oppressive states are still holding strong to antiquated ideas about matters of weed. Nationwide, however, the welcomed normalization continues with vigor. In May, for example, the Illinois Senate voted in favor of a recreational weed bill.
